1. Field of the Invention
Aspects of the present invention relate to restricting the use of each interface according to each user in an image forming apparatus installing a plurality of network interfaces, and more particularly to a method and apparatus for allowing a packet, which restricts transmission/reception of a packet according to a certain condition, in a network image forming apparatus including at least one network address.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the network printer market, products supporting not only a wired network but also a wireless network are increasing. In order to support various sites using several security policies, a plurality of network interfaces are installed. As such, in a network printer system installing a plurality of network interfaces, the use of a network interface can be diversified according to each user by adding an interface to the authority of each user account.
As applicability of a network in a printer market increases, several network interfaces are being installed in one printer. In an image forming apparatus installing a plurality of network interfaces, security policies or support protocol lists in each interface are differentiated, and thus the image forming apparatus can be suitably operated according to a policy or an object of each website.
A network image forming apparatus installing a plurality of network interfaces differentiates each interface by setting a supported protocol of each interface differently. The reason for differentiating a supported protocol of each interface is because a security level of a network connected to each network may be different. For example, a public network has weaker security than a private network, and a wireless network has weaker security than a wired network. Accordingly, a service that is provided through an interface connected to a network having weak security, is provided only to a user who is authenticated or passed encryption, so that weakness of security in the network can be overcome.
However, a conventional method of restricting a service in each interface is uniformly applied to all users. Using the conventional method, various settings are not possible while setting a possible service to each interface or each user. Accordingly, various security policies of websites cannot be satisfied.
Also, in a network image forming apparatus including a plurality of network addresses, each network address affects operations of the network image forming apparatus. A packet assigned as a valid network address is received at the network image forming apparatus under no restriction, and such a reception operation of a packet affects the operations of the network image forming apparatus. Accordingly, a packet that does not satisfy a security level can be transmitted/received without any restriction when the packet is determined to be a network address, and thus the network image forming apparatus may be weak in security.